Manchester United booked a place in the FA Cup final and put down an even more important marker. Arsenal cannot avoid twisting their necks to glance back at it even as they pursue the Champions League and Premiership trophies. Arsène Wenger's team now know for sure that they have not made themselves unassailable in England.

Having held Arsenal 1-1 at Highbury the previous weekend, Sir Alex Ferguson can brandish the win as corroboration of his claim that the Old Trafford club is in the throes of rebirth. On Saturday no one could possibly tell him that the future belongs solely to Arsenal, who lost their chance of a third consecutive FA Cup.

There are limits to the reassurance. Wenger sees no comparison between the current United line-up and the team of 1999. With tomorrow's return leg of the Champions League quarter-final against Chelsea to come, he invited his own side to treat this result as misfortune, rather than a reprise of the defining failure at the same stage of the competition five years ago that ruined their season.

He is right. Then, United thundered on to a treble that Arsenal cannot now emulate. This time Ferguson has done no more than make it likely that the trophy cabinet will not be entirely bare. The mortifications of the past few months do seem, however, to have rallied support.

A period of relative hardship can be the start of regeneration. Some of the crowd behaviour was ugly and the Arsenal physio Gary Lewin, serving as an unwitting human shield for Wenger, was hit by a coin. Even so, there was a rejuvenated passion among United fans, whose fires were also rekindled by the combativeness on the field.

At times, as Wenger complained, it was nasty. There was unseemliness, with Jens Lehmann bowling over Cristiano Ronaldo, but the dangerous violence was United's.

Roy Keane went unpunished for a hack at Robert Pires and Wenger was rightly appalled by Paul Scholes's dreadful challenge on the substitute José Antonio Reyes.

It will sideline the Spaniard for three weeks with medial ligament damage. The general hurly-burly also left Freddie Ljungberg with a broken hand that rules him out of tomorrow's Champions League match.

None the less, Wenger should concede that United were the markedly better team in the entrancing first half that decided the game. The teenager Ronaldo, starting to understand his gifts, used his tricks pragmatically to open up a yard on Gaël Clichy and deliver his crosses.

Darren Fletcher, 20, proved why Ferguson is so eager to pick him with a durable and tidy display beside Keane. Wes Brown's recovery of form and fitness comes belatedly for United, but he may be in time to make the England squad for Euro 2004.

The 31st-minute goal, though, was assembled by four of the men of 1999. Keane sent the ball to the superb Gary Neville and, with Clichy stuck out wide, he hit a piercing pass to Ryan Giggs on the right of the area. The Welshman's cut-back was driven home by Scholes.

Arsenal never recovered. Their best moments came when the game was barely begun. An Edu header put Dennis Bergkamp through for a shot against the legs of the goalkeeper Roy Carroll that broke back to the Dutchman. His chip was cleared by Brown for a corner. From it, Edu shot against the bar and Kolo Touré's header from the rebound was well saved by Carroll.

Wenger, mindful that this was the first of four matches in nine days, started with Jérémie Aliadière and only let Thierry Henry appear for the closing half-hour. He will be damned for it, but a club like Arsenal ought to be adaptable and he noted that United had coped without the injured Ruud van Nistelrooy. "It is ridiculous to reduce a team to one player," Wenger said of Henry. "I thought we created our best chances in the first half."

Anyone who dotes on football warms to Arsenal, but you can celebrate the stylishness without assuming they are an irresistible force. United did not let them get into their syncopated rhythm. "We lacked a bit of vision and simplicity around the box," Wenger conceded.

Arsenal were reduced to pushing men into the penalty area indiscriminately, where they battled grimily for crosses as if they were journeymen pros. Wenger's side are not much use at that kind of thing and he has never had any interest in adding a target man to his squad.

Now he has to bring about the immediate return of refinement. "It is a massive game and that must help us pick ourselves up," he said stoutly of the encounter with Chelsea. Even so, Ray Parlour is injured, Sylvain Wiltord lacks match fitness after missing the last three months, and only Gilberto Silva can easily be recalled now that he is back from his game with Brazil to make up for the absence of Fredrik Ljungberg and Reyes.

Although Arsenal drew 1-1 at Stamford Bridge, Ferguson doubts whether they will go through tomorrow. Wenger said sarcastically that he was "not intelligent enough" to understand this reasoning. Neither his plans nor his attitude can be shifted.

In Wenger's mind the search for trophies is inseparable from the quest for football perfection. With his squad battered and weary, that will be a high-risk philosophy this week.

Ferguson's FA Cup run

1990 Crystal Palace

Knocked over Kenny Dalglish's Liverpool, the holders, 4-3 in the semi-final and gamely held Manchester United 3-3 in the final only to lose the replay 1-0.

1983 Brighton

Managed by Jimmy Melia, right, Brighton knocked out Liverpool at Anfield in the quarter-final and beat Sheffield Wednesday 2-1 in the semi before holding Manchester United 2-2 in the final, with Gordon Smith making his name with a goal and that miss. Lost the replay 4-0.

1980 West Ham

The last lower division team to win the Cup. Beat three top-flight sides: Aston Villa in the quarter-final, Everton in a semi replay thanks to Frank Lampard Sr's diving header, and Arsenal 1-0 in the final.

Two replays with Hull, three with Forest, and one with Birmingham got Fulham to Wembley after 11 games. Lost 2-0 to West Ham

1973 Sunderland

Then of the old Second Division, they beat Arsenal 2-1 in the semi-final before producing arguably the biggest post-war upset when Ian Porterfield's goal and Jim Montgomerie's saves saw them through 1-0 against Don Revie's legendary Leeds team.

1964 Preston

The then-Second Division club defeated Swansea from the same division in the semi only to come up against West Ham of the First. Lost 3-2 in a game remembered for appearance of a 17-year-old Howard Kendall.